THE SOLAS Digital Skills Training Centre in Monavalley played an important part in the making of a documentary, which has prompted German prosecutors to open an investigation into a 93 year old woman suspected of being a former Nazi SS Guard.

The training centre supplied vital equipment and a trainee, Dylan Knapp, who proved very useful to the producers of ‘Close To Evil’.

The documentary, broadcast on RTE in September 2014, followed Holocaust survivor and Irish citizen, Tomi Reichental in Germany.

In it, Mr Reichental tries to interview a Hilde Michnia,  who is alleged to have been involved in forcing prisoners on a march during which about 1,400 women died.

A social worker from the town of Lünberg in Northern Germany, Hans-Jürgen Brennecke, having seen the documentary, filed the charges against Ms Michnia, who is suspected of a guard in the Bergen-Belsen and Gross-Rosen concentration camps.

Prosecutors in Hamburg are investigating.

The directory of the documentary, Gerry Gregg, was on RTE Radio 1’s Morning Ireland programme on Tuesday, where he said the Tralee training centre played an important part in getting the documentary made, by supplying equipment for filming and editing.

Now retired, Paul Dolan was a former trainer with FAS who oversaw the partnership between the documentary makers, Praxis Pictures, and the training centre.

“We’ve been involved with this project for a couple of years.  Praxis Pictures came to us because they had a very small budget,” said Paul Dolan.

“We made a deal that we’d give them the equipment if they took on one of our trainees so they could gain experience. We gave them Dylan Knapp and the added value with Dylan was he could speak German, which no one knew until they went to shoot in Germany,” said Paul.

“We were delighted to be involved with it and would certainly be involved with anything like that again. If a company needs a leg up we’re happy to help, it helps us as well because the best place to learn is outside the classroom,” said Paul.